Christfried Kirch

Christfried Kirch ( born December 24, 1694 Guben, † March 9, 1740 in Berlin) was a German astronomer and calendar maker.

Life and work

He was a son of the astronomer Gottfried Kirch and pair Maria Margaretha Kirch. Christfried had participated in solar observations of his father at the age of twelve years. His astronomical studies he began in Leipzig and Danzig. From 1716 until his death in 1740, he was, like his late father in 1710, director of the Berlin Observatory, despite repeated appeals to the Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg. In 1717, he was the father's place at the Royal Prussian Society of Sciences. In the continuation of its work, especially in the calendar bill, he was supported by his mother and his younger sister Christine Kirch.

1726 church was blamed for the Academy library along with Augustin Grischow who was at that time on the observatory. Until then, for their leadership of the Secretary of the Academy, Johann Theodor Jablonski, who is responsible. 1735 was employed as a librarian for the astronomer Johann Wilhelm Wagner.

Christfried Kirch published many articles in various magazines. He described the comet of 1718, observations of sunspots and the surface of Venus and Jupiter, of occultations of Jupiter's moons, of variable stars, as well as the northern lights and the earth's magnetism. In 1730 he published his major work Observationes astronomicae selectiores in observatorio regional Berolinensi habitae, quibus sunt adjectae Annotationes quaedam et animadversiones Geographicae et chrono logicae, aliaque ad astronomicam scientiam pertinentia.